Greene: It ain't over until it's over

Manny Malhotra, of the Vancouver Canucks, and Matt Greene, of the Los Angeles Kings, react after colliding behind the net during the second period in Game 2 of the Western Conference Quarterfinals during the 2012 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs at Rogers Arena on April 13, 2012 in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. (Rich Lam/Getty Images/AFP)

RANDY SPORTAK, QMI AGENCY

EL SEGUNDO, CALIF. - Three times since the NHL resumed following the 2004 lockout, an eighth seed took out the No. 1 team in the opening round.

Kings defenceman Matt Greene was with the Edmonton Oilers when they turned that trick in 2006 against the Detroit Red Wings en route to the 2006 Stanley Cup final.

"It's a different team and a different kind of scenario," Greene said Monday at the team's practice facility. "The thing you can draw on is nobody's out. As long as you get into the playoffs, you can cause some damage.

"You have to have confidence in your team. That's what we have right now."

Greene, who said Monday "it hasn't set in" his team is up 3-0 against the regular-season champion Canucks, knows full well the difficulty in knocking out the opposition, even though the Kings will have the first of possibly four chances Wednesday night in Los Angeles.

"They've got a high-powered team, you know they're going to come back and have a good game," he said. "We've got to keep playing. We're lucky to be in our situation and we've got to keep playing our game and keep going."

Speaking of luck, an interesting question was posed to Canucks defenceman Keith Ballard.

Seeing as the Canucks have outshot the Kings by a wide margin in each of the last two games only to lose them both, do they feel unlucky to be down 3-0 in the series?

"It's not really about who's lucky and who's not lucky. I don't think it matters how you feel, feel lucky or not," Ballard said. "If you feel lucky, go to the casino. It's about results."

ICE CHIPS

Kings coach Darryl Sutter was coy when asked whether forward Andrei Loktionov was injured or expected to play after missing most of third period when he took a puck off the foot ... Canucks forward Byron Bitz is eligible to return after missing the last two games due to a suspension levied when he hit Kings forward Kyle Clifford from behind in the series opener.